Various tire tread designs have been proposed to provide improved handling in various road conditions. In particular, it is known to provide sipes in a tire tread to improve worn-tire handling in wet, snowy, or icy road conditions. Providing sipes in a tire tread also helps to improve braking performance of a worn tire. It is also known, however, that the addition of sipes to a tire tread tends to decrease the stiffness of tread blocks, thereby degrading dry handling performance when the tire is new.
A need therefore exists for an improved tire tread design which provides improved worn-tire performance in wet, snowy or icy conditions, while also exhibiting good dry handling performance when the tire is new.